


The Definition of Ennui

by just_about_nothing



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Depression, F/M, Implied/Referenced Cheating, No Dialogue, No Plot/Plotless, Not Beta Read, Present Tense, Pretty much just angst, almost slice of life, ennui, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:54:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25780957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/just_about_nothing/pseuds/just_about_nothing
Summary: She is fucking miserable and had been for as long as she could remember. She feels motionless, static, empty of motivation and energy.A ficlet about ennui but mostly about me.
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character





	The Definition of Ennui

**Author's Note:**

> so like..... this is semi-autobiographical n i'm rlly upset right now (as i'm sure most of us are -- 2020 blows) so i wrote this to convince myself i'm only kinda a sack of shit like at least i can still write eh? even if it's plotless and sad.

She is fucking miserable and had been for as long as she could remember. This week was bad though. Nothing is going her way and she feels motionless, static, empty of motivation and energy. Walks through her decaying town helped -- she’d remained in the same part of town she grew up in and so the landscape was as familiar to her as her broken head. As usual, men with too many tattoos and too many years behind them stared at her, sometimes honking their horns, more often just looking. She sometimes hopes they’ll crash because they’re looking at her and not paying attention to the road. She sometimes thinks about hooking up with the ones that honk at her but the last time she did that, it ended poorly, with her naked on the lawn and the guy’s girlfriend aiming a .22 at her. In her defence, she didn’t even know the guy’s name, nevermind that he had a girlfriend.

She’s listening to miserable music to match her miserable mood, again, a ritual left over from even more painful teenage years. There’s nothing for her to do here, in this town, in this life. Work offers no pleasure and neither does her personal life. She’s no good at keeping friendships outside school and she’s not been in school for a long time. Her cat’s around, sure, but cats don’t talk and she doesn’t really think her cat would want to talk to her half the time anyway. Her father’s a few blocks away; they have dinner once a week. Her mother’s across town, in the house she bought after nearly losing her mind living in an apartment building. They see each other sometimes. Not as often as they should, given they’re in the same town. It’s not that she’s _lonely_ exactly, because it’s not the lack of human life that makes her miserable. It’s more the crushing sense of nothingness that she’s not even sure she believes in. She used to call herself an absurdist but she’s never made her own meaning for her life, so she’s not sure she can still lay claim to that term.

She sometimes thinks about her last real relationship -- insofar as she could call any of her relationships real -- he wanted her to be happy and she told him that was like wishing to see unicorns. You may want it but it’s not gonna happen without drugs. She’s thought she ought to be on antidepressants since she was about 15 but hasn’t ever brought it up with her various therapists throughout the years. She’s still got it in her head that they know better. After all, they’re the ones with the training. She’s just got fucked up genes. They’re not so fucked up she really shouldn’t have a kid, but her body and her head are messed up enough that she doesn’t want to. There’s no reason to inflict her shit on another generation. It’s another reason her and her last ex hadn’t worked out. He didn’t think their genetic problems mattered enough that children were out of the question. It’s been two years since they broke up and his new girlfriend is three months pregnant. Good for him, although she thinks this world is shitty enough that new kids probably shouldn’t come into it.

She graduated from a better school than the one in her hometown. It helped get her a high paying job elsewhere that most people would turn into her career but that she used as resume building to come back home. It’s all she wanted, really, a house and her cat and basically to be left alone. She doesn’t, and never did, think this would help her brain but there are worse things than being a homeowner in one’s early 30s -- like still having roommates or being in a bigger, more expensive city. She’s very often grateful that her mid-sized city hasn’t gotten trendy yet. She doesn’t quite think it will, there are too many rough edges. In the city she went to college in, it was safe to walk around barefoot most places. The most you had to worry about was the roughness of the cement. Here, in her hometown, there’s glass everywhere because of all the car accidents, and prickers, and needles. Hell, just the other day, someone ran over the road sign at the corner of her street. She can’t blame them, she hit her first road sign at 17. No one here can drive and she’s fine with that, except when they tailgate her and she gets rear-ended for going the speed limit.

She forgets what it was like to socialize regularly. She’s never liked clubs or loud music -- concerts get her blood flowing, but she can never remember anything once she leaves -- and so it’s harder and harder to meet new people as she gets older. Her best friend since forever is in Ohio with her husband and they’re just so so far away. Her other two closest friends are in Portland and San Francisco. They’re much closer but there are so many steps to seeing them and she can’t always make herself go through them. She wishes, sometimes, she was back in high school or college, just, at the very least, to give herself a chance for a do-over but what-if’s are useless. She’s never liked them. 

She likes to think of herself as practical but she knows, at some level, that was a misconception. She is byzantine and emotional and this causes far more chaos and pain than it should. She’s a details person but for all the wrong details. Always has been. She doesn’t count this as part of her broken brain but rather a habit she’s never been able to break. 

Her moods come and go, in and out, like the moon, like the waves. She’s feeling less miserable now. Less angry, less lonely. She’ll go out tomorrow, go do something, make herself feel better about her tiny little life.


End file.
